Kirkus Reviews

The Little Match Girl finds her way to modern-day Canada in this haunting adaptation of Hans Christian Andersen's bleakest fairy tale. After moving from big-city Montreal to rural Ontario, all Jack wants to do is settle into 12th grade, make some friends, and date a cute girl. Instead he begins seeing visions of a starved matches-selling waif in 19th-century Copenhagen amid a lugubrious fog that makes everything else disappear. As Jack and his new girlfriend, Lucy, race to discover the Match Girl's hold over them, it becomes clear that the Match Girl doesn't simply want a visitor. She intends to keep Jack in her world…permanently. In her latest novel, Bennett splits the narration among Jack, the Match Girl (now named Klara), and Lucy, a talented artist whose physical resemblance to Klara is uncanny. The result is an absorbing narrative that tempers its dark subject matter with humor and boasts three white protagonists with distinct personalities, ambitions, and fears. Klara's interior monologue is particularly intriguing, as it gives nuance and agency to a character known for suffering in silence. Discovering the connection among the protagonists is half the fun of this teen mystery, which also uses Klara's obsession to remind readers of the damage selfishness and loneliness can cause. A definite crowd-pleaser for fairy-tale enthusiasts and fantasy lovers. (Fantasy. 14-18)

School Library Journal (Sun Jan 01 00:00:00 CST 2017)

Gr 8 Up-Twelfth grader Jack Lavoie is adjusting to life with Type-1 diabetes as well as his recent move from an alternative school in his old hometown of Montreal, Quebec, to his new school in Ontario. Then he meets, befriends, and falls for a fellow new student, Lucy, a loner who is rebuilding her life after the death of her father and a short stint as a runaway teen on the streets of Toronto. Jack and Lucy's budding romance is interrupted by the presence of the mysterious Match Girl. Yes, that Match Girl, from Hans Christian Andersen's classic fairy tale. The Match Girl, whose real name is Klara, appears during Jack's low-insulin episodes and is determined to bring him into her world. Lucy stumbles onto an unexpected familial connection to Klara after the death of her own paternal grandfather, and she realizes that she has the key to unlock Klara's hold on Jack. Bennett grabs readers immediately and successfully bridges Andersen's classic fairy tale and contemporary YA fiction. In addition, she accurately depicts Jack's trials and tribulations as he tries to manage his diabetes, without portraying him as a stereotypical victim. The author also creates a believable, complex relationship between Lucy and her mother. VERDICT Fans of intergenerational books will appreciate Bennett's solid storytelling and her inspired incorporation of Hans Christian Andersen's works. Consider for both school and public library YA collections. Donald Peebles, Brooklyn Public Library

Voice of Youth Advocates

One day in math class, Jack is inexplicably drawn away to a different time and place. He sees a young girl selling matches on the street. Before he can figure out who she is or why he is there, he is pulled back to real life. On the same day, Lucy is walking home from school and sees a vision of a girl in old fashioned clothes calling out Jack’s name. These strange things happen over and over again, and Jack and Lucy come to realize that this girl, the Match Girl, is actively trying to draw Jack back in time in an effort to keep him with her forever. The Match Girl and Lucy begin a tug-of-war over Jack, with one trying to draw him to her and one trying to help him stay. Through a series of interesting coincidences, they eventually discover something to give the Match Girl that she wants more than Jack.

ALA Booklist (Sat Oct 01 00:00:00 CDT 2016)

Imagine this: one moment you're in math class and the next you're standing on an cobblestone street, face-to-face with the ragged little match girl from the famous Hans Christian Andersen story. While at first Jack attributes his otherworldly transportation to low glucose levels (potentially dangerous for a diabetic such as himself), he soon makes friends with a student named Lucy, who has had her own interaction with the match girl. As Jack's visits to the other realm grow more frequent, he and Lucy band together, determined to find out what the match girl wants. Told in minichapters from the viewpoints of the three main characters, and interspersed with fictional bits of Andersen's journal and tragic letters from the match girl's mother, the book is imaginative, though also scattered, which lessens the consequence of its journey. Though not as tense or frightening as it intends to be, it is certainly well written, and the concept of finding oneself transported to the land of a famous children's story has terrific potential.

Horn Book (Tue Aug 01 00:00:00 CDT 2017)

When Jack is spirited away to a dark street in another time, he's convinced that his insulin must not be working properly. But he keeps returning, and a shadowy street waif becomes determined to keep Jack there forever; meanwhile, classmate Lucy is also having visions of the same girl. Supernatural melds intriguingly with fairy tale in this twist on Andersen's "The Little Match Girl."